


the light the water reflects

by auras



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-20
Updated: 2018-06-20
Packaged: 2019-05-25 11:42:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14976455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/auras/pseuds/auras
Summary: The boy has ocean-blue eyes, and a gaze that pierces through all the red.





	the light the water reflects

**Author's Note:**

> disclaimer: i wrote this before season six, events in the fic take place from pre-canon to somewhere around season three
> 
> huge thanks to my amazing friends and beta readers, [ang](http://kvgane.tumblr.com) and [mo](http://redbayards.tumblr.com)

Here I am with a mind like a loaded gun and scar tissue for a heart.

**L.H.Z, _Midnight Excerpts #45_**

 

 

**✩**

**QUESTION:** How did we form constellations from our messy stars? 

 

* * *

 

It’s a strange thing to do, wishing on shooting stars.

To put your trust in something so fleeting, with the belief that it can grant you good luck, fortune, happiness, love, or whatever you desire most.

He had seen one once, when he was younger.

“Look, there,” his father had pointed out as the white ball of light zipped across the sky, “It’s a shooting star. Make a wish, Keith, and it just might come true.”

He’d stared at night sky; a sheet of dark barely illuminated by the faint twinkling of stars, giant spheres of gas burning themselves up, light years away.

“I missed it,” he had said.

You can’t make wishes on things that aren’t there.

He pressed his lips into a thin line. The tears at the corners of his eyes were burning.

You can’t wish for things that are no longer there.

 

* * *

 

Something his father had told him: “It’s okay to cry, Keith. Emotions are not a weakness; they’re what make us human.”

_No._ _He had been wrong._

A promise his father had made, the same day: “I’ll be back soon, I promise.”

_No. He had been a liar._

 

* * *

 

He curses the universe, for making his mother leave.

He curses the universe, for taking his father away from him.

He curses the universe, yelling out to the skies and sobbing in the quiet darkness of his room. The sounds reverberate in the empty space. There is no reply.

 

* * *

 

He enrols in the Galaxy Garrison as soon as he turns sixteen.

Shiro had offered him a spot in the program, and he’d been quick to say yes.

Too quick, maybe, because he has always felt awkward and out of place in the Garrison. Sure, he can adapt to their routine and does well in classes and scores good marks, but he’s never felt like he properly fit in.

He’s not even fully sure why he had enrolled in the Galaxy Garrison in the first place.

He was different from all the other cadets. Everyone in the Garrison, they belonged in the academy. They had things that he didn’t: dreams, goals, aspirations, parents, a home.

He doesn't belong.

 

* * *

 

He finds out in his first week that there is a gym in the Garrison which remains open to cadets and teachers 24/7, in case they want to train and work on their physical fitness.

The gym becomes a place he frequents regularly soon enough. He’s not sure when it became a habit of his, but he starts spending more and more time at the gym to fill up the empty hours of the night, on nights where he finds it hard to sleep.

The teachers have found him up training in the wee hours of the morning more than once. They have long since given up on trying to make him leave, to get a night of proper rest. “Just be sure to put everything back in place once you’re done,” they will say in resignation before they leave the room.

He trains until his legs give out.

 

* * *

 

On the nights that he _can_ fall asleep, he gets nightmares.

Flashes of images that feel familiar and yet aren’t. They feel like déjà vu, but also like a forewarning. They’re everywhere; sharp purples and reds filling his vision while the acrid stench of blood and rust over-stimulates his heightened dream senses.

He wakes up drenched in cold sweat every time. His mouth tastes dry and ashy and his throat feels raw, like he’s spent hours on end screaming. The ghostly traces of the dreams linger, remnants of the nightmare at the back of his head.

The fear that grips him is almost palpable each night, its inky tendrils wrapping around him. It surrounds him in the icy darkness of his room, and when it finally closes in on him it suffocates him, chokes him.

 

* * *

 

A fact about pain: over time, you start to build a tolerance to it, both physically and mentally. You have to; it is the only way to survive.

By the time that Shiro, too, is forcefully wrenched from his life, he had already learnedㅡtaught himselfㅡto rein in his emotions, to grit his teeth and hold his tears in. The strong don’t— _can’t_ —cry.

Some of the teachers at the Garrison who know how close Shiro was to him offer him sympathetic murmurs and their condolences when they walk past him down the hallways. In response, every time, he nods stiffly and bites down on his lip until crimson droplets start to flow.

No weaknesses, the empty hallways hiss.

 

* * *

 

After the news of the Kerberos mission breaks, he finds himself spending even more time in the Garrison gym. It becomes more than just a way to spend his time—it becomes a distraction. It is a distraction from the outside world and a distraction from the pain of losing Shiro.

It becomes a refuge of sorts, almost. Focusing on the thrusts of his knife or the hooks of his arms keep his mind occupied. The stinging of his aching muscles is almost enough to make him forget about the ache in his heart.

His mother, his father, and now his brother too. His fingers curl around the metal hilt of his knife as he slashes at the dummy. A repeated action, over and over again.

His motions are robotic: cold, mechanical, unfeeling. He wants to be numbed by the icy steel of the blade; he does not want to feel _._

 

* * *

 

He hears the whispers in the hallways of the Garrison, rumours spread in the classrooms. Some good, some bad.

“Hey, did you hear about that Keith kid? I heard he got into another fight with the teachers.”

“Keith, the fighter pilot? Isn’t he the top pilot of his class? A prodigy, I heard.”

“Doesn’t he have, like, anger management issues or something? Shouldn’t he be seeing someone for that?”

“Maybe he’d be best fit to go on solo missions. When you’re sent up it’s just you and your ship and space.”

“With Shirogane gone, how do you think he’ll react?”

(He reacts much later on by punching Iverson in the face during a training session, after the Commander had made an offhand comment about how a student’s failure to double-check all the safety gear would be the cause of their death, like _Shiro_. He gets booted from the Garrison two days later. Iverson is wearing an eyepatch on the side Keith had punched when he tells him, although the tiny piece of cloth can’t hide all of the injury; pale purple marks could be seen blooming at the sides of the patch. Again, some good, some bad.)

 

* * *

 

He has always felt an _energy_ , heard something calling and beckoning to him. He could never quite place a finger on it.

It becomes even stronger the day after he leaves the Garrison and finds himself in the desert. It was something indistinct and unfamiliar and yet, he feels compelled to follow, to seek it out.

He’s not sure why, he tells Shiro later on. Shiro says that it’s okay, that everything happens for a reason; he’d come to understand why in the future.

 

* * *

 

Something he has taught himself over the years: the best way to protect himself is to put walls up. Don’t let anyone in. Don’t get close to anyone.

The closer you are to someone, the closer their place is to your heart, the easier it would be for them to tear it apart.

So he breaks connections as soon as he can, tries to keep others as far away from him as possible. He does not remember the teacher who taught him how to swing his first blade, or the nice girl from the Garrison who used to tend to his wounds post-training. He pushes memories of them out of his mind.

He forgets, he forgets, he forgets.

 

* * *

 

His days at the Garrison were more or less a routine.

They consisted of the usual lessons and exercises and drills that the other fighter pilot class students had as well, except that his would be... _punctuated_ with the occasional fistfight.

He can’t exactly remember why most of the fights started, now. All he remembers is red: the red-hot anger, red like the blood on their broken lips, the red haze that blurred his vision.

_Red_ has been the only thing he’s felt for years now.

 

* * *

 

“Hey, you’re that fighter pilot everyone’s been talking about! Keith, right? The name’s Lance.”

The boy has ocean-blue eyes, and a gaze that pierces through all the red.

 

* * *

 

Keith finds Shiro, on the night that the meteor-like object crashes into earth, painting a streak of red against the navy of the midnight sky.

The older man is strapped to an examination table, held in custody by staff from the Garrison, judging from the symbols on the technology Keith finds in the tent. Keith rushes into the tent, knocking out the other staff members in the room and hastily going over to free Shiro from the restraints. He’s helping the other man to stand up shakily when he hears a voice coming from in front of him.

“Oh no you don’t, I’m the one who’s saving Shiro.”

There’s significantly less pressure weighing him down as the owner of the voice moves to Shiro’s other side to hoist the man up too. Keith grunts, shooting the newcomer a quick glare before turning his focus back to Shiro.

“Who are you?”

The other boy scoffs. “The name’s _Lance?_ From the Garrison. Don’t you remember?”

It sounds vaguely familiar, but Keith can’t match the name to a face. All the faces in his memories have been forcefully blurred out.

He turns to look at the other boy to snap a reply back, and that’s when Lance turns his gaze up to send Keith a scathing look. Their eyes lock, and Keith finds himself staring at a pair of ocean-blue eyes.

He remembers. He remembers, he remembers.

 

* * *

 

(The calling had been from the Blue Lion. She knew; she had been tugging at the emptiness and longing in his heart.)

 

* * *

 

Lance catches him once, in the middle of the night outside the kitchen as Keith is sneaking to the training deck for more practice.

They kind of catch each other red-handed, actually, because Lance had been stealing a midnight snack. Lance didn’t seem that startled though, promptly recovering from his initial shock and starting on the chocolate-flavoured food goo that Hunk had created a few days ago.

“You’re going to train _again?_ At this hour?” he asks, looking up from his bowl of goo to give Keith a pointed look.

Keith shrugs. He doesn’t really know why Lance was asking. Training was a normal thing for him and no one cared most of the time.

“I can’t sleep.”

“So you’re going to _train?_ ”

Keith scowls at him. “Lay off me, alright? I’m going to train because I don’t have anything else to do.”

“I’m just saying, man, there are plenty of other things to do in the Castle. There’s the observatory deck or the garden or the pool. I convinced Coran to install a jacuzzi.”

Keith frowns. He looks down to where he’s toying with his bayard, moving it from hand to hand.

“I don’t have anything else to do,” he repeats, firmer this time. He’s no longer sure whether he’s trying to convince Lance, or himself.

Lance doesn’t say anything for a while, and he just gives Keith a _look_. It’s scrutinising, like he’s trying to figure something out. Then he shrugs, “Whatever, just don’t overdo it. Voltron needs all five of its paladins in full health.”

He dumps his unfinished bowl of food goo into the chute, and heads back out towards his room. Before Lance leaves, he places a hand on Keith’s arm, taking care not to touch where there are scars from previous battles. He gives the other boy a serious look as he says, “I mean it, Keith. Don’t work yourself to death. Shiro would flip.”

He leaves, then.

(The feeling and heat of Lance’s touch stays, though, and it burns hotter than everything else from the training session that night.)

 

* * *

 

Keith finds that his Galra heritage makes it hard for him to interact with locals on the planets that they go to for diplomatic missions sometimes.

It seems like _everyone_ can tell that he’s part Galra, and they’re not shy about letting him know.

He hears their hushed whispers of gossip, their distrusting and disdainful eyes flickering to him every now and then.

“Hey, isn’t the red paladin part Galra?”

“He might act on his Galra instincts and snap or something if we’re not careful.”

“Are you sure we can trust him? I know he’s with Voltron and all, but shouldn’t he feel some sort of loyalty to his blood too?”

Allura had warned him not to do anything brash that might jeopardise their mission. So Keith clenches his fist and keeps his head down, forcing down the harsh words and retorts clawing at his throat.

(At the end of the day, it is Lance who snaps at the aliens, telling them to back off. “He’s still a paladin, no matter what his race is. And he’s an honourable one, at that,” Lance says, the fierce glint in his eyes daring anyone to speak back against him. “He’s still one of us.”)

 

* * *

 

The nightmares come back, after they lose Shiro again.

They’re even more intense than they were back on Earth. Gross, distorted images that drill incessantly into his head, a murky mix of ink-blacks and blood-reds and bruise-purples. A jumble of thoughts as his mind screams cruel reminders that Shiro was gone, that Haggar was coming after them, that he is Galra.

He wakes up, clawing desperately at nothingness. Keith screams, quiet at first, but his traitorous throat morphs it into audible sobs and warbles.

He curls into himself, back hunched as he draws his knees to his chest and he folds his arms around his trembling body. A fragile attempt to protect a fragile heart.

Keith hears the hurried footsteps into his room, but he doesn’t dare look up. He feels a warmth surround him as a jacket is draped over him and long limbs wrap around him, carefully, while soothing words are murmured in his ear. Clear and calming, the words ripple through him.

_“Breathe.”_

He does.

 

* * *

 

“We’ll find Shiro, Keith, I _swear_ it,” Lance whispers against his hair, rubbing circles on his back.

Keith tilts his head up to look at the other boy. Lance’s eyes are a raging ocean, a quiet storm ready to break.

“I swear,” Lance repeats, pressing his forehead against Keith’s, and his hand to Keith’s cheek. His touch is gentle and warm; _alive_. It’s nothing like the cold, unforgiving steel of the blade.

“Okay,” Keith says, leaning into the other boy’s touch. “Okay.”

He closes his eyes. In the darkness, he can’t see, but he can _feel._

 

* * *

 

“You can come to my room any time you want, if you can’t fall asleep,” Lance tells him the next morning, “I know how hard nightmares can get. It’s always helped to have someone with me.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course,” Lance says. His thumb brushes gently at the edge of Keith’s lips, where the skin is bruised blue but healing. “We're friends. You don’t have to bottle it up. Please.”

Lance offers him a small smile as he stands up from the bed and leaves the room. There is an empty space beside Keith where the other boy had been lying, but unlike all the other times, the warmth lingers.

 

* * *

 

“I miss Earth, I miss home,” Lance tells him, once, after the other paladin had convinced (or rather, dragged) Keith to sit out on the observatory deck to relax and watch the stars together, because “if you train any more, you might actually drop dead on the spot, Keith”.

Keith gives him a non-committal hum, and Lance immediately turns to him, wide-eyed.

“Shit, sorry, I didn’t mean—” he babbles, flapping a hand hastily like he’s trying to dispel the heavy air.

“It’s alright,” Keith shrugs. His fist is clenched, but he pretends not to notice.

“You know,” Lance says, “my mama always told me—cliché as it sounds—that home doesn’t necessarily have to be a physical place. And I think she’s right; she usually is. I think _home_ can be anything that makes you feel like you belong. When I think of home, I think of something that makes me feel content and warm inside. Metaphorically speaking.” He scratches the back of his head in embarrassment as his tongue pokes out slightly to wet his lips.

“It’s kind of hard to properly define, I think,” Lance continues. “It’s more of a feeling, really.”

Keith hums again, this time out of curiosity. “What is it to you, then?” he asks, softly.

“Home is my family back on Earth,” Lance says, “But also my family _here_.”

“The team, they’ve become family to me too. In that sense, they’re my home now.” Lance offers Keith a lopsided grin. “That includes you, mullet.”

Lance’s hand slides towards his and he rests it over Keith’s fist. Lance’s hand on his is a reassuring touch, and Keith finds his clenched fist relaxing unconsciously.

“Thanks, Lance,” he says, the sides of his own lips twitching upwards in the tiniest of smiles.

Lance’s hand doesn’t move from his, even after the other boy dozes off, filling the silence with his gentle snores.

(It makes Keith feel content, and warm inside.)

 

* * *

 

He thanks the universe, for giving him Voltron and his team.

He thanks the universe, for giving him _Lance_.

He thanks the universe, a hushed murmur as he lies curled up with Lance in the other boy’s room. The steady beat of Lance’s heart is enough of a reply.

 

* * *

 

Something Lance tells him, during one of their nights spent in each other’s arms: “You don’t have to hurt alone anymore. I’m here for you.”

A promise Lance makes, sworn against his lips, and then his heart: “I’ll stay with you ‘til the end of time, I promise.”

 

* * *

 

“Holy shit—Keith, did you see that?” Lance exclaims, tugging on Keith’s hand. “It’s a shooting star. Make a wish!”

Keith rolls his eyes in mock exasperation. “Were you even listening when Allura gave the briefing?” he asks. “Those aren’t shooting stars, they just _look_ like it. They’re the method of transportation the locals use.”

Lance groans. “You’re no fun, mullet boy,” he says, pouting petulantly. “Don’t ruin _my_ fun just ‘cause you’re _boring_ and listen to _briefings_ and stuff. We’re not even on this planet for anything serious; just to pick stuff up for the Castle-ship’s maintenance.”

“So you admit you weren’t listening to Allura,” Keith says instead, ignoring Lance’s half-hearted jibe.

“Shut up,” Lance grumbles, “Just humour me and make a wish.”

“Fine, fine,” Keith laughs. Lance hums, satisfied and looking pleased with himself.

As Lance makes his own wish, he tightens his grip on Keith’s hand and gives it a tiny squeeze. Keith looks down to where their fingers are laced together; they fit perfectly, Lance’s fingers in the spaces between his own.

Keith feels his lips tug up into a smile. His cheeks are burning; from blushing or from smiling too much, he doesn’t know.

He does not make a wish, at the end of the day.

You don’t need to wish for things you already have.

 

* * *

  

**ANSWER:**  We took our pieces and made art.

**Author's Note:**

> You have me. Until every last star in the galaxy dies. You have me.  
>  **Amie Kaufman, _Illuminae_**


End file.
